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  So she unlocked the door and went with him from room to room, flipping on the lights, scanning each area carefully. Except for Duchess, the house was empty and everything was where she'd left it. Nothing had been disturbed.

  Threading her arms through his, she walked Brian back to the front door. Her heart was close to bursting, and she felt conflicted. How would all this work out?

  Brian opened the front door again and then paused on the other side of the threshold. The look in his eyes melted her.

  "Thanks for being so understanding." She'd never meant anything so heartily in her life.

  Brian brushed his lips against hers, purposely holding his body rigid so that their lips were their only point of contact. "That's what I'm here for." He deliberately banked down the ache in his chest. "I'll call you tomorrow."

  Lila nodded. "Tomorrow." She'd give him his answer tomorrow, she promised silently. But tonight, she just wanted a little time to herself.

  She watched him walk back to his car and then closed the door because she knew that he wouldn't leave until she did.

  Lila leaned against the door, suddenly exhausted. Was she crazy not screaming "yes" to his proposal and jumping into his arms? It was what she really wanted to do. Brian would never hurt her the way Ben had. What was she afraid of?

  And then she knew, perhaps had known from the beginning. She was afraid of having it all fall apart on her. Despite how perfect the situation seemed, how perfect Brian seemed, she was afraid of everything crumbling like a house of cards.

  Because once upon a time, Ben had seemed perfect, too.

  Her headache grew.

  She couldn't think about this now. Maybe tomorrow, after a good night's sleep, she could sort it all out and put her fears to rest once and for all.

  Instead of the bedroom, Lila changed direction and walked into to the kitchen. Whenever she felt stressed, she drank a glass of warm milk. It was old-fashioned and her kids had teased her about it more than once, but for her this remedy worked. At least it had in the past. With any luck, it would work again, she thought, opening the refrigerator.

  * * * * *

  When he pulled away from her house, Brian began to head for home. Halfway down the second block, he changed his mind and made a U-turn. Home could wait.

  He was far too restless to go to sleep anytime soon. Too many things were running around in his mind. Rather than head home, he found himself driving toward the precinct on the outside chance that the DNA test had come through early and that the lab tech had an answer for him. He knew he was pushing things, that even a rush job took longer than he was happy about, but sometimes the stars all aligned themselves and all went according to plan.

  At least he could hope.

  * * * * *

  Less than one third the usual number of cars were in the precinct parking lot at this hour. Because of recent budget cuts, the night shift had been scaled back, as had the number of people who worked in the crime investigation unit. But a few people were still working and all he needed was one overzealous lab technician to make his day—or night, Brian amended, looking up at the dark sky as he ascended the steps to the precinct.

  The sergeant behind the information desk seemed surprised to see him. Until this moment, except for a handful of non-emergency calls, it had been a very quiet night. The sergeant, a twelve-year veteran, was alert. "Something wrong, Chief?" she asked.

  He shook his head. No point in saying anything until all the facts were in. "Just wanted to check on something, Cynthia."

  The brunette nodded, and he made his way to the elevators.

  Rather than go up to his office, Brian went down to the basement where the crime scene investigation labs were located.

  At that time of night, there was very little traffic. His footsteps echoed in his ears as he walked down the long hallway to the tech lab where he'd dropped off the DNA sample.

  Only one technician was on duty, but it had come to his attention that Nathan Sinclair, an overachiever since he was five, was worth at least three regular technicians. He lived and breathed the department and no one knew their way around the equipment the way he did. It was Nathan he'd given the samples to in the first place.

  Stopping in the doorway, Brian glanced in. Bent over a report, Nathan had his back to him.

  Brian didn't bother with a greeting. Entering, he asked, "Anything?"

  Nathan looked at him and instantly his sparse mouth stretched into a smile. Brian recognized triumph when he saw it and banked down a wave of excitement.

  "Just came in over the wire in the last ten minutes," Nathan told him. "I was just about to call you, as per your orders," he added to cover himself. "I made this my priority."

  "I appreciate it." Brian thanked him because it was expected and after his hard work, Nathan deserved to hear it. However, his entire focus was on the question he asked next. The question that had risen up like a living, breathing entity ever since he'd first looked at the surveillance tape from the bargain store. "What's the result?"

  "You buried the wrong man," Nathan told him simply. "I don't know yet who you did bury, but it's definitely not Ben Mclntyre."

  Brian knew that Lila had given them a few strands of Ben's hair with the follicles still attached, but he wanted to be absolutely certain. "You're sure?"

  Nathan raised his right hand as if he were in court, taking a solemn oath. "Never more sure of anything in my life."

  He needed to tell Lila. "Great job," Brian said, already on his way out.

  "You want me to try to find out who you did bury?" Nathan asked, as if searching for a new challenge.

  Taking out his cell phone, Brian pressed the single key that would connect him to Lila's landline. "I'd appreciate it."

  "You got it," Nathan called after him.

  Brian hardly heard him. Striding down the hall back to the bank of elevators, he frowned. The phone on the other end just kept ringing. Lila wasn't picking up. She had several extensions throughout the house so she was bound to hear one of them no matter what room she was in.

  Unless she'd gone out, he thought suddenly.

  Why would she go out? She been dead on her feet.

  Nervousness flared through his veins like unharnessed lightning.

  Ben wasn't dead. What if...?

  Brian hit the key he'd assigned to her cell phone. It went to voice mail after three rings.

  Something was definitely wrong.

  Cursing under his breath, a sense of urgency pervading him, Brian ran past the elevators and hurried to the stairs instead.

  He took them two at a time.

  "Chief?" Cynthia asked as she saw him all but burst through the door and fly by the desk to the front doors.

  "Send a patrol car to Lila Mclntyre's house, 1232 Hamilton Street," he rattled off, sparing her the need to look up the address.

  Cynthia knew better than to ask why. Picking up the phone, she called the dispatch officer.

  Damn it, Brian cursed himself, hurrying down the steps to his car. Why hadn't he insisted on staying with her tonight? Why had he opted to give her space? She didn't need space, she needed to be safe.

  The empty streets whizzed by him as he drove, praying it wasn't too late.

  * * *

  Chapter 15

  « ^ »

  The moment Brian turned onto the street, he saw the flames.

  Lila's house was on fire.

  Because it was still localized on one side of the first floor, from the looks of it, the fire had just begun. In the distance, Brian was vaguely aware of the sounds of approaching sirens.

  He didn't have time to wait for help.

  After parking in the driveway, Brian bolted up the lawn to the front of the house. The door was locked. Banging on it with his fist brought no response from within, except for the sound of Duchess, barking. Mercifully, he didn't feel any heat along the wood. That meant the fire hadn't made its way across the whole floor.

  Yet.

  Within thirty sec
onds of his arrival, Brian stripped off his jacket, wrapped it along his arm and smashed through the living room window. Not wasting any time clearing away the remaining glass, he dove in.

  Jagged pieces scraped against his skin. The smell of smoke was everywhere, but he was right. The flames hadn't reached this part of the house yet.

  "Lila! Lila, where are you?" There was no response. He called out her name again with the same results.

  Duchess came to the head of the stairs, barking urgently.

  "She's upstairs, isn't she?" he called to the dog. Duchess turned on her heels and ran back to Lila's room. Brian ran up the stairs, two at a time. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see flames coming out of the kitchen. He didn't have much time.

  Heart pounding, Brian reached her room. The door was open. Lila lay in bed, sound asleep from all appearances. Why didn't she wake up when Duchess began to bark? Losing no time, he crossed the room and shook Lila by the shoulder.

  "Lila, wake up! Wake up! The house is on fire."

  Neither the words nor his shaking managed to wake her. For all intents and purposes, Lila seemed dead to the world.

  Panic materialized on the perimeter of his consciousness.

  Running into the bathroom, Brian soaked one of the towels in water. He doubled back and threw it over Lila's face just before he pulled her out of the bed. She never stirred, but he could feel her chest rising and falling. At least she was still alive. He wasn't too late.

  The smoke began to fill the air. Breathing was becoming a challenge. Brian picked Lila up into his arms. "Follow me," he ordered the dog.

  Duchess did just that, shadowing his footsteps as he made his way down the stairs as quickly as he could.

  The heat seemed all around them, but the flames had not yet caught up. It was only a matter of minutes, if that. The flames had multiplied, leaching out of the kitchen and swiftly working through the first floor. He was aware that his lungs were bursting by the time he reached the bottom of the stairs.

  Lila wasn't stirring, and he was afraid of why.

  By the time he'd made it through the front door, he gasped for breath. The dog was barking louder than ever. The sweet smell of air as he filled his lungs was all but overwhelming. Coughing, gasping, he drew it in as quickly as possible.

  His heart pounded so hard, he was sure it would crack one of his ribs. The second he'd emerged, he saw that squad cars now littered the street. More sirens echoed in the night, growing louder as they heralded the approach of fire trucks.

  Brian dropped to his knees, still holding Lila.

  "I'll take her, Chief," someone behind him volunteered, but Brian shook his head, afraid of backing away from her. Afraid of losing her. "Look after the dog," he ordered.

  Placing Lila on the grass, he began giving her CPR until a coughing fit got in his way.

  And then he felt hands on his shoulders, gently but firmly moving him aside. The next moment, a paramedic had taken his place, giving Lila CPR.

  Someone tapped Brian on the shoulder. "Come with me to the ambulance," the man's partner said.

  Brian couldn't tear his eyes away from the prone figure on the grass as the first paramedic did compressions on Lila's chest. Duchess pranced around her mistress, clearly distressed.

  "I can't leave her," he protested.

  "It's just a few steps, Chief." Gently, the paramedic urged him over to the rear of the ambulance. Firemen and hoses snaked across the lawn now, with geysers of water crashing down on the flames. "You won't be leaving her," the man reassured him.

  For the next several minutes Brian felt like someone frozen in the moment. The back doors of the ambulance were open and he sat on the edge, holding an oxygen mask to his face and taking in deep breaths. He was hardly aware of what he was doing. All his attention was focused on the woman still on the ground. And then, despite all the din, above Duchess's barking, he heard it. Heard Lila cough. She was alive!

  But still unconscious.

  Unable to stay still any longer, Brian let the oxygen mask drop beside him, threw off the blanket from his shoulders and quickly made his way back to Lila.

  "Is she going to be all right?" he demanded of the paramedic still working over her. Duchess looked up at him with the same question echoed in her brown eyes.

  The man nodded, retiring the stethoscope he'd just used, leaving it hanging around his neck. "Her heart's strong."

  The older of the two paramedics guided a gumey over toward Lila. "We need to take her to the hospital. I think she's just suffering from too much smoke inhalation, but we can't be sure."

  Brian shook his head. It wasn't that. "When I arrived, there was hardly any smoke upstairs." There had to be another reason why he hadn't been able to wake her.

  The paramedic who'd been working over her rose to his feet. "It's not smoke inhalation," he said as he helped his partner place her on the gumey. "She appears to have been sedated."

  "Sedated?" Brian echoed, saying the word as if it belonged in a foreign language.

  Snapping the legs of the gumey into place, the two men guided it to the back of the ambulance. The paramedic talking to Brian nodded. "Do you know if she takes sleeping pills or tranquilizers?"

  Brain shook his head. "She doesn't believe in them." She'd told him that all it took to put her out was a warm glass of milk. That didn't sound like someone who would resort to sleeping pills.

  "Well, maybe she changed her religion," the younger one commented. "Because I'm pretty sure she took some tonight."

  Or someone slipped them to her, Brian thought, looking around. An icy feeling raked down his spine as the thought penetrated.

  The street filled with Lila's neighbors, drawn by the sound of sirens and the commotion. Brian scanned the faces in the crowd quickly, convinced that Ben was responsible for this. Yet he still had no explanation as to why the man was trying to spook Lila, and then, when that hadn't worked, switched gears to smoke her out. Was this some sort of demented revenge on Ben's part?

  He had no answers and that frustrated the hell out of him.

  Except for her next-door neighbor, the faces he saw were unfamiliar to him. The one thing he did know was that Ben was not among them.

  The paramedics placed Lila inside the ambulance. As they began to close the door, Brian put his hand in the way to stop them.

  "We need to take her in, Chief," the head paramedic told him politely.

  "I'm not trying to stop you," Brian explained. "But I am coming with you."

  Neither paramedic felt up to arguing with the chief of detectives.

  "Wait one second," Brian instructed. He waved to the next-door neighbor. "Alice, would you watch Duchess for Lila?"

  The woman seemed more than happy to be of some use. "Don't give it another thought, just be with Lila," she urged.

  Brian nodded, not saying anything. He rode to the hospital holding Lila's hand and praying.

  Lila never opened her eyes.

  * * * * *

  She was aware of spinning. Was the room spinning?

  Why? Was there an earthquake? She'd experienced earthquakes before, especially that large one in San Francisco more than a decade ago. But then things had rocked and swayed, they hadn't spun.

  Prying her eyes open after several attempts, Lila realized it wasn't the room that was spinning, but her head. Spinning and hurting and making everything seem very, very fuzzy.

  Where was she?

  Bright sunlight streamed into the unfamiliar room. Daylight. Blinking, she tried to sit up and the enormous headache all but consumed her. For the moment, the pain flattened her.

  The headache was so bad her teeth hurt.

  Gingerly, Lila drew in a long breath. And then she saw him. Brian. Slumped in a chair, his eyes shut, he appeared to be sleeping.

  Was this some sort of strange dream?

  If it was, why did her head feel as if a marching band had just held an all-night, marathon rehearsal in it, complete with fiery batons?

  "Brian
?" The first time she attempted to say his name, only her lips moved, but no sound came out. She tried again, this time with moderate success. The third time his name was audible.

  His eyes opened instantly. In less than a quarter of a heartbeat, he was on his feet beside her. Worry furrowed his brow, but he smiled encouragingly and took her hand in his. "How are you feeling?"

  "Like somebody turned me inside out." She placed a hand to her throbbing forehead. "I can't seem to focus my mind." Lila searched his face, hoping for answers. "Where am I?"

  "The hospital."

  Relief blew through him like a cool wind across the night desert. She was going to be all right. All night, he'd tortured himself with the thought of what could have happened—would have happened—had he not followed his gut instinct and gone to her place.

  "Hospital?" she repeated incredulously. "What am I doing here?"

  "It's a long story." He wasn't going to tax her with the truth, not until she was strong enough. He held her hand a little tighter. "Lila, did you take anything last night?"

  Confusion entered her eyes as she tried to make sense of the question. "Take anything?"

  "Yes," he nodded. "Like sleeping pills or a tranquilizer?"

  "No," she denied vehemently, her confusion growing. He knew better than that. Even when she'd been shot, she tried to refrain from taking painkillers because they made her head feel so fuzzy.

  Fuzzy.

  The way she felt right now.

  Thoughts began to hook up in her head.

  Her breath caught in her throat. "I had a glass of milk like I always do," she told him, the words rushing out after one another. "It tasted a little funny." Lila raised her eyes to his face. "Did someone do something to my milk—?"

  There was no point in keeping the information from her. The toxicology test the hospital ran on her clearly pointed to her having ingested at least two of the stronger prescription sleeping pills. He knew she wouldn't have done it by choice.

  "You were drugged, Lila." He had to tell her at least part of it. But in his opinion, she'd gone through too much for him to tell her the full story just yet. "Whoever's been harassing you must have gotten in and either drugged the carton of milk, or at least the glass of milk you drank." Since the kitchen had burned, there was no way to verify his theory but he believed it just the same.